Taiye Feyisayo Adedeji’s Journey to Becoming a Mother of Triplets after Six Years of Trying to Conceive

“Please go back and be sure that I am pregnant and it is not your equipment that is reading my IVF medication. Go and be sure that I am pregnant.” Those were Taiye Feyisayo Adedeji’s words to her doctor when she confirmed she had taken in. Taiye had been waiting for six years and had done four IVFs that failed.

She gave up at a point, but picked herself up again. She tried it one more time and it was positive! She delivered her triplets- a girl and two boys, just the way she wanted and had always prayed for.

In this interview with Sola Abe for Woman.Ng, Taiye speaks about her waiting journey and the power of positive confession.

The journey

I got married in May 14, 2011, and I wanted babies immediately but it wasn’t happening. So, after a year, we went to see a doctor and the journey for IVF began. We started IVF from 2012 to 2015. I did two in the United States and two in Naija, but it all failed.

One thing I remembered is that, during my third year anniversary, we had a programme in my church (Fruitful Vine) and it was on my wedding anniversary day. I wrote a prayer point and I said I want triplets-two boys one girl and the church prayed and agreed with us. Since then, I had the baby names, so I tell anybody that was talking to me or praying for me that I want triplets not twins. I just want to go into the labour room once and I’m out with three babies.

In 2016, we didn’t do anything. I wasn’t ready to go to any hospital. It was a year of break for me. Then 2017, after much persuasion from my dad, he booked me with a fertility doctor and told my husband to take me to see the doctor. I went to the hospital and when she saw me, she could see in my eyes that I had lost hope because after the fourth failed IVF, I decided I was done.

So, that day, I just went to the hospital to hear what the doctor had to say. She started asking questions but it was my husband that was answering. She now goes, “Taiye, I’m not leaving you until you are pregnant.” I just said, “Madam, that is money and we don’t have that money. We are not even doing IVF but my daddy said I should come and I decided to come.”

And she goes, “I’m feeling led to start now.” Those were her words. I was surprised to hear a doctor telling me “I’m feeling led,” putting God with IVF, but I wasn’t still interested. So, I said, “what is it you want to do that is different?” Then, she started giving me options and asked to run some tests and scans.

Then I remember that the first nurse I met said my promise for the year, “Job 8:22- Madam, God will fill my mouth with laughter and my lips with shouts of joy.” In my church, we pick a promise for the year; you pick a sheet of paper with a bible passage every first day of the year. And I just started crying because I knew my coming there that day wasn’t normal, it was God ordained because nobody told her my bible verse for the year and in my church, my pastor would tell you that if it is one bible verse you know, hold on to it, it’s your weapon, fight with it, confess it daily, it will work wonders, so I just said, “let’s do it.”

So, we started the procedure in January and the doctor said my body needs to rest in March and then I got pregnant in May. When the doctor heard the heartbeats, and heard three, she said, “Taiye, you sha said you want three and you have three, I’m hearing three heartbeats. I’m a doctor but I can’t explain your confession and faith. Sometimes, when I put in three embryos, everything sticks. Other times, one may stick or nothing stays.”

And the whole pregnancy thing, it went well and we have the babies to show for it.

Waiting

The whole waiting, something that looked like it was never going to happen, happened. Initially when I started waiting, I was always sober when my friends get pregnant. In fact, almost all the girls on my train had given birth except one that will be getting married soon. I got married at 23 and I wanted the babies fast. Whenever I hear someone gave birth, I would be so sober but with time, conscious effort, encouragement and the word of God, I started being happy.

The day God got me was with a colleague of mine, she got married at 32 and she got pregnant immediately. When another colleague of mine told me about it, I just started crying. Then I thought that I got married at 23 and I’m still waiting six years and no baby, she got married at 32 and she took in immediately, like the next month she was pregnant but I picked the good and said, “to everyone, there is a time and my own will come.”

I had this consolation that nobody will birth my children. And then, when I close early from work, instead of going home and being sober, I go to my sister’s house to play with her kids. In fact I tell my siblings, “come with your kids for the weekend.” They will gladly send their babies to my house over the weekend. I made my house comfortable and I had toys at home.

You just have to find a way to make yourself happy and stay positive because in all of this you have to be in the right frame of mind. I think the day I stopped crying was when my husband told me, “Do you think you are the only one that cries? I cry too, so why are you crying and making me feel tired?”

On why she was persistent with the IVF

I’m aware of technology, I’ve read so much about IVF. I just wanted to keep trying, doing everything I need to do just to be done with that phase of waiting as soon as possible. Because I always joked that, I want to be done giving birth when I’m 30 years because in my 50s, I want to be a grandma. I delivered the babies three months after my 30th birthday. For me, I didn’t want to sit down and say it will happen. Faith without action is nothing. I was seeing doctors, I got tired. A whole year, I didn’t see any doctor but they still talked me into going back. For me, I wouldn’t have sat down; I would have been trying everything possible to have the babies.

Giving up

That was 2015 after the fourth failed IVF. I didn’t like the way the hospital treated me. They just left me to my fate, they couldn’t just tell me what was wrong and we spent so much and I did everything they wanted me to do, so, I gave up. I just said I was done. If you’ve done IVF before, then, to do four; giving yourself injections, the whole pain, the emotion, your hormones are everywhere, you are destabilized. I will look pregnant this month and the next month….. That was when I knew I gave up. In fact in 2016, I didn’t go to see any doctor. Everybody was on my neck but I said no. Not until January 2017, when my husband talked to me to go and see that doctor.

The power of positive confessions

I attend a church that they make you understand that the word of God works for you. That third year that I wrote that prayer point, my husband was next to me and I said, “triplets,” and he said no problem. We wrote the prayer point and pushed it. The church agreed and we started praying about it and I had a revelation about their names, Oluwatumininu, Oluwatimilehin and Oluwatomisin.

We started calling ourselves by those names and kept on confessing the words and going to church to encourage ourselves in the word. For me, it was the power of the word and action. In 2017, when the doctor said “let your body rest in March, we will continue the process in April,” I calculated nine months and I was like “God, this year is going again, won’t I have my children this year?” But see how it happened, I was confirmed pregnant in May and the babies came December that same year.

Her reaction to her pregnancy news

The day of the pregnancy test, my husband asked us to go in the morning but I said, no, because during the two weeks (after embryo transfer), I didn’t feel anything, so, I was skeptical. Previous IVFs, I bought pregnancy strip test but this one, I didn’t buy. I told him I wanted to go after work so that I don’t look moody in the office if it was negative.

So, he came to pick me at work and we went. I was in the waiting area eating when the doctor came in and said, “Mrs Adedeji, congrats, you are pregnant.” I said, “Madam, please go back and be sure that I am pregnant and it is not your equipment that is reading my IVF medication. Go and be sure that I am pregnant.” She said, “I’m a doctor, you’re very pregnant.” I said, “Go and check the HCG level” and she said “madam, you are very pregnant.”

On the day of the delivery, when I heard them cry, I just started crying. On the night of my delivery, I told the nurses that I just wanted to see them. I couldn’t hold all three babies at once; I held them one by one. I remember I held the babies the way they came. I can’t explain the joy. It was just awesome. I was like, “so this is real, these are my babies, so they came out from my body.”

On her husband’s support

My husband was very supportive. There was no where I said, “Femi, let us go and try this, he will go. Let’s go and see this pastor, let’s go to this church, let’s go to this vigil, he will go. If I say Femi, they said it’s only me they want to see, he’ll say you’re not going.” Even when I see my period, my husband will still put his hand on my stomach and say, “you will carry my babies, I don’t care whether you’re seeing your period.”

I appreciate that about him because it is very rare to see men like that. We hold hands, pray together at night and cry together. I never doubted my husband’s loyalty to me at that time because we were always together most of the time, and we always pray together. There’s a level of trust that I already placed him on, we were just so into each other and he was so supportive.

What her waiting journey taught her

It drew me closer to God. It helped my relationship with God. If I didn’t go through this waiting, I don’t think I would have this kind of relationship that I have with God. I don’t let anything that doesn’t matter disturb me. I’ve come to understand that every human being is going through something. Appreciate that fact, so don’t give them your own headache. Just stay happy and be happy for people.

To women on this journey

Don’t give up; it’s definitely going to happen. It has a beginning; it surely, has an ending. Hold on to God, he never fails. Stay focused and happy and make sure you’re doing something that gets you closer to it. I didn’t sit down; I did four IVFs between 2012 and 2015.

I tell people that I started doing IVF a year after my wedding and they asked why I was in a rush. Some people would wait till after five years but that was what the doctors recommended for me and that was why I said, stick to your doctor’s advice. Don’t just sit down doing nothing. My pastor will say “go and see your doctor, let your doctor tell you what is wrong, so that you will know what to pray about. Use the medication your doctor gave to you and pray it works for you.” I wasn’t just confessing, they were backed with actions.